Introduction
AC is one of Britain's oldest surviving car names. It began in south London in the early 1900s with a three-wheeled delivery tricar, built cars at Thames Ditton in Surrey from 1911 to 1985, and still builds Cobras today at Donington Park in Leicestershire. This history follows the company through its main owners: Weller and Portwine, S.F. Edge, the Hurlock family, Brian Angliss and Autokraft (with Ford from 1987 to 1992), and Alan Lubinsky.
The chapters draw on Grace's Guide, the history written by the AC Owners' Club archivist John Spencer, the Motor Sport archive, race results databases, auction catalogues and Companies House. Wikipedia was used only to find leads. Where sources give different dates or figures, the text says so, and the main disagreements are collected under Where sources disagree at the end of this page. A companion page, AC Cars Compared, sets out every model side by side.
1901 to 1930: Weller, Portwine and S.F. Edge
AC began with the Weller brothers of south London, though sources do not agree on when. The AC Owners' Club archivist John Spencer says Weller Brothers was formed in 1899 to make self-propelled vehicles. Grace's Guide says they started as general engineers in 1900 and entered the motor business in 1902. The often-quoted founding date of 1901 comes from secondary accounts. In 1903 the Wellers showed a 20 hp touring car at the Crystal Palace motor show.
Their backer, John Portwine, thought a touring car too costly to build. He pushed instead for a cheap three-wheeled delivery vehicle. Weller and Portwine set up Autocars and Accessories, and in 1904 production began of the Auto-Carrier, a single-cylinder delivery tricar with tiller steering. It sold well to London shops. A passenger version, the Sociable, followed in 1907 with a seat in place of the cargo box. Grace's Guide and Spencer both date the change of name to Auto-Carriers Ltd, and the first A-C badge, to 1907.
By 1911 the firm had outgrown its premises and took over the Ferry Works at Thames Ditton, Surrey, formerly used by the engineers Willans and Robinson. In September 1911 the business passed to a new company, Auto Carriers (1911) Ltd.
The first four-wheeled AC, a light two-seater with its gearbox on the rear axle and a Fivet engine, appeared in 1913. Few were built before the First World War stopped car production. During the war the works made shells and fuses, according to Grace's Guide; Spencer adds munitions and aircraft parts.
John Weller designed a two-litre six-cylinder engine with an overhead camshaft. It was running by 1919 and in full production by 1922. From 1928 AC used it in every car, and it remained in production until 1963, a run of more than four decades.
S.F. Edge, formerly of Napier, began buying AC shares in 1919, once his agreement not to compete with Napier had expired. Spencer says he became Governing Director in 1921. In 1922 Weller and Portwine resigned and the company became AC Cars Ltd. Edge promoted the cars through competition. In June 1921 Harry Hawker drove a single-seater AC over the Brooklands half-mile at 105.14 mph. On 24 November 1922 J.A. Joyce took the 1½-litre hour record at Brooklands, the first time a light car had covered more than 100 miles in an hour. Motor Sport has given his speed as both 100.39 mph and 101.39 mph. In 1924 Joyce raised the record to 104.19 mph.
In January 1926 the Hon. Victor Bruce and W.J. Brunell won the Monte Carlo Rally in a six-cylinder AC two-seater, the first British win in the event. The next year Mrs Victor Bruce won the Coupe des Dames in an AC Six saloon.
In 1927 Edge bought the company outright for £135,000 and re-registered it as AC (Acedes) Cars Ltd. Sales were already falling. After the crash of 1929 the company went into voluntary liquidation and Edge sold his interest. Car production stopped, and in 1930 the remains of the business were sold to the Hurlock family.
1930 to 1953: the Hurlock brothers
In 1930 William and Charles Hurlock bought what was left of AC, including the High Street site in Thames Ditton. William became managing director and Charles general manager. Grace's Guide describes their existing business as haulage; AC Heritage calls them motor dealers. They had wanted the site mainly as a depot, but they let AC's service work continue. One car was built for William Hurlock in 1930, and a small run followed, mostly from leftover parts.
Standard agreed to supply new chassis, and a new range was launched in 1932. Every car used the Weller two-litre six in different states of tune. Spencer records at least 21 models between 1932 and 1939, and says the names Ace and Greyhound were first used in this period. In October 1934 Motor Sport listed the 16/56, with 56 bhp, as a chassis at £320 and as a Greyhound saloon at £435, and the triple-carburettor 16/66 open four-seater at £450. A short-wheelbase 16/80 Competition model followed at the 1935 London Motor Show, and AC Heritage says 28 were built before a restyle in 1937. The 16/90, with an Arnott supercharger at £35 extra, was shown in 1938. Output stayed small, under 100 cars a year.
The best-known result of the decade came in 1933, when Kitty Brunell and an all-female crew won the RAC Hastings Rally outright in an AC Ace. The Talbot Owners' Club says she remains the only woman to have won the RAC Rally.
From 1937 AC moved into rearmament work: aircraft components, fire trailers, fire-engine bodies, motorised invalid chairs and guns. Spencer says the workforce grew from about 140 to about 630 over this period.
Car production restarted in 1947 with the Two-Litre saloon. A prototype appeared in January and the first production car left the works in October. It used the 1,991 cc six with three SU carburettors in an ash-framed aluminium body. A drophead coupé, the Buckland open tourer and, from October 1952, a four-door saloon followed. Spencer gives output of about 250 a year by 1949. The ac2litre.com register counts 1,296 chassis up to 1958, about 70 of them Bucklands; other sources give 1,284.
In 1947 and 1948 AC invested in a government-sponsored programme of single-seat three-wheeled invalid carriages. Spencer says they first brought in substantial revenue in 1949 and 1950, and Grace's Guide says production continued until 1976. AC also built trains for Southend Pier, which entered service in 1949.
The company went public in 1951. On 16 October 1952 it announced the Petite, a two-seat three-wheeler built on the invalid carriage chassis, with a 346 cc Villiers single-cylinder two-stroke engine, at £398 10s including purchase tax. By 1953 AC was a small public company building the Two-Litre, invalid carriages and the Petite. That October it showed a new sports car at Earls Court.
1953 to 1962: Tojeiro, the Ace and the Aceca
In the early 1950s AC had an ageing range and an engine designed around 1919. Its new direction came from John Tojeiro, a sports-car builder at Buntingford. He had built a tubular ladder-frame chassis with independent suspension at all four corners by transverse leaf springs. The club racer Cliff Davis had Tojeiro build one with a Bristol six-cylinder engine and a barchetta body, and raced it through the 1953 season. Motor Sport later called it "the most photographed car of 1953". Through Ernie Bailey, a friend of Tojeiro's, the design reached the Hurlocks, who bought the rights for a royalty of £5 a car, limited to 100 cars.
AC fitted its own two-litre engine and showed the result, the Ace, at the Earls Court Motor Show in October 1953. By early 1955 more than sixty had been delivered.
The Aceca
A closed version, the Aceca, was shown at Earls Court in October 1954. It shared the Ace's steel ladder frame and suspension, but its body was built on a composite frame of welded steel tube and ash, panelled in aluminium. To keep noise out of the cabin, a one-piece glassfibre bulkhead and dashboard sat between engine and passengers, and the final drive was mounted on rubber. At the back was a top-hinged tailgate. Several sources call the Aceca the second production car with a hatchback, after the Aston Martin DB2/4 of 1953. Motor Sport visited Thames Ditton in early 1955 and found the first production Aceca being assembled in late January.
That report gave the Aceca's price as £1,722 7s 6d including purchase tax, against £1,439 0s 9d for the Ace. Charles Hurlock expected the Aceca body frame to weigh no more than 160 lb, against 147 lb for the Ace's. RM Sotheby's puts the finished coupé 155 lb heavier than the open car. Road & Track tested an Aceca-Bristol in February 1958, praised its "totally unexpected smoothness, quietness and general all-round tractability", and noted that AC built only ten to twelve coupés a month. According to the reprint of The Autocar's test of an Aceca-Bristol, published on 8 April 1960, it recorded a mean maximum of 115.5 mph and 0 to 60 mph in 10.3 seconds, at £2,409 9s 2d including purchase tax. No contemporary test by The Motor has yet been found.
| Aceca engine | Years | Capacity | Power | Number built |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AC six | 1954 to 1963 | 1,991 cc | 85 to 90 bhp | 151 |
| Bristol six | 1956 to 1963 | 1,971 cc | 105 or 125 bhp | 169 |
| Ford Zephyr six (Ruddspeed) | 1961 to 1963 | 2,553 cc | up to 170 bhp | 8 |
| Total | 328 |
Grace's Guide gives 151 with the AC engine and 169 with the Bristol, but also a total of 357. RM Sotheby's adds the 8 Ford-engined cars and says around 325 in all. The 151, 169 and 8 figures appear to go back to Sedgwick and Gillies (1986); no factory record has been found.
Bristol and Ford engines
From 1956 AC offered the Bristol two-litre six, derived from the pre-war BMW 328, in both cars. In 100D2 form it gave about 120 to 125 bhp. Overdrive became available in 1956 and front disc brakes from 1957. The Ace-Bristol and Aceca-Bristol became AC's mainstay. The United States was the key export market, and Ace-Bristols were consistently successful in SCCA production-class racing.
AC raced at Le Mans. In 1957 Ken Rudd and Peter Bolton drove a near-standard Ace-Bristol to 10th overall, second in the two-litre sports class. In 1959 Ted Whiteaway and John Turner drove Ace-Bristol 650 BPK to 7th overall. It was the only two-litre GT car to finish, and so won its class. Only 13 cars were classified as finishers.
In October 1959 AC announced the Greyhound, a four-seat coupé on a wheelbase about ten inches longer, with coil-spring suspension. Engines ranged from the AC six through Bristol units to the Ford Zephyr. The Motor's 1961 test of a Bristol car recorded 110 mph and 0 to 60 mph in 11.4 seconds at £3,185. About 83 were built before production ended in 1963.
When Bristol stopped making its six, Ken Rudd's company in Worthing converted the 2.6-litre Ford Zephyr engine in stages of tune up to 170 bhp, sold as Ruddspeed. These were offered in the Ace and Aceca from 1961; Grace's Guide gives 1962 for the Ace. Motor Sport's August 1961 test of a 155 bhp Ace 2.6 recorded 123.8 mph and 0 to 60 mph in 9.6 seconds. About 37 to 40 Aces and eight Acecas were built with this engine. Ace and Aceca production ended in 1963, by which time the Cobra had taken over the works. Published Ace totals range from 689 to 732.
1962 to 1973: Shelby, the Cobra and the 428
In September 1961 the American racing driver Carroll Shelby wrote to Charles Hurlock proposing a Ford V8 in the Ace chassis. Bristol had just decided to stop making its six, so AC needed a new engine. Ford soon agreed to supply small-block V8s.
The prototype, CSX2000, was built at Thames Ditton early in 1962 with thicker main tubes, stronger suspension, inboard rear disc brakes and a Salisbury limited-slip differential. Sources date its completion from January to late February 1962. It was flown to California and finished with a 260 cu in Ford V8, and it was shown at the New York Auto Show in April 1962. The pattern for production was set at once: AC built rolling chassis and bodies in Surrey and shipped them to Shelby American, which fitted engines and gearboxes.
The early cars kept the Ace's transverse leaf springs. About 75 had the 260 engine before the 289 replaced it. The Mark II of 1963 brought rack-and-pinion steering. Totals for the leaf-spring 289 cars range from about 571 to 580 depending on the source.
The closed Daytona coupé was built to beat Ferrari's 250 GTO on fast circuits. Six were made, the first in California and five by Carrozzeria Gransport in Modena. At Le Mans on 20 and 21 June 1964 Dan Gurney and Bob Bondurant drove one to fourth overall and won the GT class. In 1965 the coupés won Shelby the FIA International Championship for GT Manufacturers, settled at the Reims 12 Hours in July.
In 1965 came the much heavier 427 Cobra (Mark III), with a new coil-spring chassis and Ford's 427 cu in V8. The World Registry of Cobras and GT40s, as quoted by RM Sotheby's, lists 343 coil-spring cars, 260 of them for the road. Shelby's involvement ended in 1967. AC carried on with the AC 289 Sports for Britain and Europe, combining the coil-spring chassis with the 289 engine. Classic & Sports Car says 27 were built, and the last, in 1969, ended Cobra production at Thames Ditton.
The company was now led by Derek Hurlock, William's son, who became chairman in 1965 and was managing director until 1986. His grand tourer was the AC 428. Bertone turned the project down, so a lengthened 427 chassis went to Pietro Frua in Turin in May 1965. The prototype was shown at Earls Court in October 1965 and the fastback at Geneva in 1967. After about six cars with the 427 engine, AC changed to the cheaper 428 cu in Ford V8. Hagerty gives launch prices of £4,610 for the convertible and £4,850 for the fastback. Bodies were built in Italy and the cars finished in Surrey, which made them slow and costly to produce. Hagerty records 81 built, 52 fastbacks and 29 convertibles, the last in July 1973. Crash-test rules, the energy crisis, strikes at Frua and Ford's decision to stop supplying engines directly all played a part in its end.
By 1973 AC's steady income came from invalid carriages. At Earls Court that October it showed the 428's replacement, a mid-engined car with a transverse Ford 3-litre V6. Motor Sport expected production in spring 1974. It did not begin until 1979.
1973 to today: the 3000ME, Autokraft and the later owners
The last car designed under the Hurlocks began elsewhere. Peter Bohanna and Robin Stables built a mid-engined prototype, the Diablo, and Derek Hurlock bought the design. AC showed its version at Earls Court in 1973, with a 3.0-litre Ford V6 mounted across the car. Production took six years: in 1976 the prototype failed the 30 mph frontal crash test that new Type Approval rules required, and the chassis had to be redesigned. The first customer car was delivered at the end of 1978, and most sources give 1979 as the start of sales. The 3000ME had 138 bhp and faced the Lotus Esprit. Most sources say 71 were built at Thames Ditton before production there stopped in 1984 or 1985 (sources differ).
In 1984 AC licensed the car and the name to AC (Scotland) plc of Hillington, Glasgow, which planned an Alfa Romeo V6 version but went into receivership in 1985. That year car-making at Thames Ditton ended after more than seventy years. The High Street works were demolished in about 1987 and replaced by offices called AC Court.
Brian Angliss's company Autokraft, at Weybridge near Brooklands, held the original Cobra jigs and tooling. With AC's agreement and Ford's approval it built a revived Cobra, the Mk IV, from 1982, and Motor Sport reported the first cars going to Chicago. In 1986 the Hurlock family sold their interest, and by 1987 AC Cars Ltd was owned jointly by Autokraft and Ford. In 1988 the company moved into a new factory on the Brooklands industrial estate. About 480 Mk IV Cobras were built between 1982 and 1996.
The partnership was meant to produce a new Ace, shown as a prototype at the Birmingham Motor Show in October 1986, but relations broke down. According to Hagerty and the AC Owners' Club archivist, Ford sought to wind up the company from 1990; in 1992 Angliss bought out Ford's interest. A largely new Brooklands Ace, with a stainless-steel chassis, aluminium body and Ford 5.0-litre V8, was shown at Earls Court in 1993. AC Cars Ltd went into receivership in March 1996.
In late 1996 or 1997 (sources differ) Alan Lubinsky, a South African businessman, bought the assets through Pride Automotive. Production continued at Weybridge with the Mk IV, the carbon-bodied CRS and the supercharged Superblower, and about a dozen more Aces were built before that model ended in 2000. AC then moved to Frimley in 2001, Guildford in 2004 and Malta, where AC Motor Holdings set up a factory at Hal Far. The Malta operation built very few cars and closed in 2007 or 2008; MaltaToday reported in 2012 that Malta Enterprise was still owed money from the venture.
The brand was later held by Acedes Holdings LLC, and small-scale production of Cobras resumed in Britain and Germany. Gullwing GmbH built the AC MkVI, with a 6.2-litre Corvette V8, first shown in Monaco in April 2009. At Geneva in 2012 AC presented the 378 GT Zagato, developed from the South African Perana Z-One.
In July 2020 AC announced the Cobra Series 1 Electric, 58 cars with a 54 kWh battery at £138,000, and the Cobra 140 Charter Edition with a 2.3-litre Ford four-cylinder engine. An all-new car, the Cobra GT Roadster, with an aluminium spaceframe, carbon-composite body and Ford 5.0-litre V8, was launched in London on 12 May 2023, with prices expected to start from about £285,000. AC says the first customer cars left its works at Donington Park in June 2025, and a GT Coupé was revealed in June 2026.
At Companies House in October 2026, AC Cars Ltd (05226569) and AC Car Group Ltd (06232994) are both active, registered at Donington Park. AC Cars Ltd was incorporated in 2004 and AC Car Group Ltd in 2007. Alan Lubinsky's current appointments as a director of both date from 2010; he was earlier a director of AC Cars Ltd from 2004 to 2007. He is the person with significant control of AC Car Group. David Conza became a director of AC Cars Ltd in June 2022.
Timeline
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 1899 to 1902 | Weller Brothers formed (dates vary by source) |
| 1904 | Auto-Carrier tricar enters production |
| 1907 | Sociable passenger tricar; company becomes Auto-Carriers Ltd |
| 1911 | Move to Ferry Works, Thames Ditton |
| 1913 | First four-wheeled AC, with Fivet engine |
| 1919 | Weller six-cylinder engine running; S.F. Edge begins buying shares |
| 1922 | Weller and Portwine resign; AC Cars Ltd; Joyce's 100 mph hour record |
| January 1926 | Victor Bruce wins the Monte Carlo Rally |
| 1927 | Edge buys AC outright; AC (Acedes) Cars Ltd |
| 1929 | Voluntary liquidation |
| 1930 | Hurlock brothers buy the company |
| 1932 | New range on Standard chassis |
| 1933 | Kitty Brunell wins the RAC Rally |
| October 1947 | First production Two-Litre saloon |
| October 1952 | Petite announced |
| October 1953 | Ace shown at Earls Court |
| October 1954 | Aceca shown at Earls Court |
| 1956 | Bristol engine offered in Ace and Aceca |
| June 1957 | Le Mans: Rudd and Bolton 10th overall |
| June 1959 | Le Mans: Whiteaway and Turner 7th overall, GT 2-litre class win |
| October 1959 | Greyhound announced |
| 1961 | Ford 2.6 Ruddspeed engine offered; Shelby writes to AC |
| April 1962 | Cobra CSX2000 shown in New York |
| 1963 | Ace, Aceca and Greyhound production ends; last Weller engines |
| June 1964 | Daytona coupé wins the GT class at Le Mans |
| 1965 | GT Manufacturers' title; 427 Cobra; 428 prototype at Earls Court |
| 1969 | Last AC 289 Sports |
| July 1973 | Last 428 completed |
| October 1973 | 3000ME prototype at Earls Court |
| 1979 | 3000ME on sale |
| 1982 | Autokraft Mk IV Cobra begins |
| 1984 to 1985 | 3000ME production ends; AC (Scotland) fails; Thames Ditton car-making ends |
| 1987 | Ford and Autokraft jointly own AC Cars Ltd |
| 1992 | Angliss buys out Ford |
| March 1996 | AC Cars Ltd in receivership |
| 1996 or 1997 | Alan Lubinsky buys the assets |
| 2007 or 2008 | Malta factory closes |
| July 2020 | Cobra Series 1 Electric and 140 Charter Edition announced |
| May 2023 | Cobra GT Roadster launched |
| June 2025 | First GT Roadster deliveries from Donington Park |
Where sources disagree
| Topic | What the sources say |
|---|---|
| Founding date | 1899 (Spencer); 1900 and 1902 (Grace's Guide); 1901 (secondary accounts) |
| Joyce's 1922 hour record | 100.39 mph (Motor Sport, 1973) or 101.39 mph (Motor Sport, 1946) |
| Two-Litre total | 1,284 or 1,296 chassis (ac2litre.com); end 1956 or 1958 |
| Ace launch price | £1,297 7s 6d in 1953 (Motor Sport, 1990) against £1,439 0s 9d in March 1955; probably a price rise, not confirmed |
| Aceca total | 328 by engine (151, 169, 8) against 357 (Grace's Guide) and about 325 (RM Sotheby's) |
| Ace total | 689 (Grace's Guide), about 723 by engine, 732 (Shelby American Collection) |
| Ford 2.6 start | 1961 (Motor Sport) or 1962 (Grace's Guide, Ace page) |
| 289 Cobra total | about 571 to 580; the SAAC registry figure was not available online |
| 428 split | 52 fastbacks and 29 convertibles (Hagerty) or 51 and 30 |
| 3000ME total | 71 at Thames Ditton (most sources); some add about 30 from AC (Scotland); production ended 1984 or 1985 |
| Lubinsky purchase | December 1996, late 1996 or 1997 |
| Malta dates | Start 2004, 2005 or 2006; closure 2007 or 2008 |
Sources
Used throughout: Grace's Guide: AC Cars; AC Cars History, John Spencer, AC Owners' Club archivist (PDF); AC Owners' Club: A Brief History of AC. Wikipedia pages were used as leads only and are not cited.
1901 to 1930
- Grace's Guide: Auto-Carriers
- Grace's Guide: A.C. (Acedes) car
- Grace's Guide: Selwyn Francis Edge
- Motor Sport, October 1973: Some AC history
- Motor Sport, December 1946: Great British achievements VI
- Motor Sport, March 1976: Looking back with the Hon. Victor Bruce
- Goodwood: AC record-breaking centenary
1930 to 1953
- ac2litre.com: Brief history and Production
- Motor Sport, October 1934: A guide to 1935 high-performance cars
- Motor Sport, November 1952: Back to the cyclecar
- AC Heritage: 1939 AC 16/90
- Talbot Owners' Club: Kitty Brunell
1953 to 1962
- Motor Sport, March 1990: Within an Ace
- Motor Sport, March 1955: What some of the smaller firms are doing
- Motor Sport, November 2014: When they were new, AC Ace
- Grace's Guide: Aceca, Ace and Greyhound
- racingsportscars.com: Le Mans 1957 results
- RM Sotheby's: 1955 AC Aceca and 1963 AC Aceca
- Simanaitis Says: Road & Track's 1958 Aceca test
- This archive's reprint of The Autocar's 1960 Aceca-Bristol test
- Car & Classic: 650 BPK, 1959 Le Mans class winner
1962 to 1973
- Shelby American Collection: CSX2000
- RM Sotheby's: 1967 Shelby 427 Cobra (World Registry figures)
- Motor Sport, January 1965: International race results of 1964
- Motor Sport, November 1973: At Earls Court
- Hagerty: Cars that time forgot, AC 428
- Classic & Sports Car: Driving the AC 289 Sports
1973 to today
- Driven to Write: Born survivor, part two
- Britain by Car: Autocarriers and AC Cars at Thames Ditton
- Motor Sport, May 1984: AutoKraft AC MkIV
- Hagerty: Cars that time forgot, AC Ace (Autokraft)
- Silodrome: AC Brooklands Ace
- MaltaToday, June 2012
- evo: AC MkVI
- CAR: AC 378 GT Zagato at Geneva 2012
- Goodwood: electric AC Cobra
- Professional Motorsport World: Cobra GT Roadster unveiled
- AC Cars: GT Roadster production, June 2025
- Companies House: AC Cars Ltd and AC Car Group Ltd
About the author
A lifelong classic-car enthusiast in North Yorkshire, near Thornton-le-Dale, who owns and maintains an AC Aceca, writing the single-model reference he always wished existed. Read the full bio.